


Not by Wisdom Alone

by hellscabanaboy



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Bling - Freeform, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-27
Updated: 2015-09-27
Packaged: 2018-04-23 17:04:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4884793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellscabanaboy/pseuds/hellscabanaboy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"For Finrod had brought more treasures out of Tirion than any other of the princes of the Noldor," or, Finrod what are you doing with all this bling in the middle of the arctic?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not by Wisdom Alone

**Author's Note:**

> Being sappy, obviously. What did you expect?
> 
> Written for a comment by [Gileonnen](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Gileonnen) on tumblr.

“Findaráto, where on earth did you get that?”

Finrod glances up from the cooking fire at the sound of his cousin’s voice, though what he first sees is little Idril’s hands reaching down to him from above. Aredhel snatches her back, hoists her up on her hip. “Get what?” he asks.

“That necklace. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it before, and at this point I’ve seen _everything_ here before.” She slumps by the fire with what Finrod feels is rather an exaggerated sigh, holds her hands out over the flames. “I’d swear I’ve even seen that rock before.”

She wraps Idril’s hands in her own to warm them, but directs Finrod’s gaze to the offending rock with a jerk of her head, and he looks out after her. “You haven’t. Telumendil is still rising to our right, we haven’t been turned astray. So rejoice, cousin; it’s a _new_ rock!” The great craggy mountains of the beginning of their journey have given way to nearly flat plains of snow, only broken here and there by ice-covered boulders that loom over the heads of the host. It’s a safer journey by far, with no need to fear falling from the treacherous heights, and any wild animal that might threaten them visible from far off. But that does nothing to change the cold, their rapidly dwindling supplies of bread and fuel for the fire. The despair. “And I know you’ve seen this necklace, I wore it to your hundred and third begetting day. Or was it hundred and fourth?”

Aredhel squints at it dubiously, before turning away again to get a better hold on Idril as she squirms “Okay, but I know you weren’t wearing it when we left, because you were wearing that gold one that matched your mail. Weren’t you? _Please_ , go ahead, take her.” Finrod scoops Idril from Aredhel’s lap onto his knee, where her hand promptly closes around the end of the necklace and grips tight. She’s old enough now to know not to try and pull it off, so he lets her be, and reaches around her to flip the seal meat grilling over the fire before it can char. “Really, how much jewelry did you bring with you anyway?”

“All of it.”

“All of--Findaráto!” A couple at the next cookfire turn around at Aredhel’s shout, and she lowers her voice to an abrupt hiss. “You had _rooms_ full of that stuff!”

“It packs well.”

“Tyelkormo used to complain that you kept Curufinwë almost as busy with smithing as his father did!”

“Well, he was the best, wasn’t he, or one of them anyway. Of course I wanted more of his work. He could have said no if he didn’t want to.” Finrod shrugs reasonably, or tries to; he might have been wrong about Idril not trying to get the necklace off. “Why are you so shocked? It’s not like ‘Arafinwë’s son wears gemstones!’ is some kind of new scandal.”

“We’ve lost people on this ice.” She carefully doesn’t look at him, or rather doesn’t look at Idril trying to squirm from his lap. “I know it grieves you as much as anyone, but--we could have brought more bread, Findaráto!”

“If we’d had more to bring.” He lets Idril grab hold of the necklace again, which at least has the side effect of making sure she stays put in his lap. Leave it to his cousin to have a daughter who can run before she can even properly talk. “You’ve been talking to Turukáno.”

“Someone needs to.”

“He needs to let them first. I’m honestly relieved, even if his caution looks absurd on you.” She makes a face, and in a way that’s a relief as well. “Besides, we can’t live on bread alone.”

“Uncle!” Idril takes that moment to say, “ _stars_!”

He laughs, reaches up to unlatch the necklace from his throat. “Yes, very like.” He holds it up against her chest; a sheet of tiny crystals set into links of polished silver that move with the wearer. On Finrod it’s wide; on Idril it may as well be a little gorget. “Perfect for a girl who’s raised under their light.” He takes off his bracelet as well, though it doesn’t match. Even wrapped twice round her wrist it’s too loose, but it sits round her ankle perfectly.

“I may not have the power of Fëanáro, to set light into my hand,” he says. “But I can let it be seen all the same.”

Idril giggles and twirls away, and this time he lets her break free of his grip and dash round the fire, silver gleaming gold in the light like the mingling of the Trees. She skips, almost wobbles, but hops up nimbly as a doe and spins as though she had meant to do it all along, like the movement comes as naturally to her as breathing.

“We should keep hold of her,” Aredhel hisses, who has never once suffered anyone to hold her still as a child or now. And Finrod can perhaps concede the appropriateness of Turgon’s wisdom with respect to Turgon’s child, but then they can’t live on wisdom alone, either.

“It’ll be all right,” he says. “She knows her footing.” And he draws a breath, dances up at the stars, and sings.

He has no song in mind, so he simply sings of the constellations, imagines their paths drawn at Idril’s feet, and the child dances across them with the lightest of steps, joy and concentration mingled in her face like Fëanor’s sons at their forges. Like she could carry them to Beleriand on her feet alone, guiding them with starlight and gem-light, and no matter how far into exile they might drive themselves they will still be Noldor.

Finally Finrod glances up, and his song breaks off in the midst of a note. “Speak of the stars, and the stars shine,” he murmurs.

A small crowd has gathered around them to watch, and at front of them all is Turgon, still as a statue as he watches his daughter. Finrod swallows, suddenly, absurdly guilty. He gets up from the fire, starts forward to take Idril back in his arms, but before he can get there Turgon replaces him in song, low voice as though it might have risen from the earth somewhere far beneath the snow. His song is a real hymn, one their grandmother’s people had used to sing before Varda’s seat, and though it couldn’t have been more unlike Finrod’s song Idril dances if anything with greater enthusiasm than before.

Turgon had professed never to judge himself as much of a singer - and his judgment isn’t entirely unjust - but under the stars, with the snow crunching beneath his feet, Finrod can scarcely remember hearing one sweeter.

Turgon finishes the hymn to its last notes, and for a moment still stands staring, as though he’s not quite sure what he has done. Then he walks slowly over to the fire where Aredhel still sits and lowers himself to the ground by her side, tall and stiff. Idril still dances in his wake, the art of the Noldor mingled again with the little girl’s twirling, and Finrod draws her over to the fire with him before he sits down beside them.

“What a pleasure that you would deign to join us, brother,” Aredhel says, but the laugh on her voice is as giddy as the one in Finrod’s own chest.

“I have never been away,” says Turgon calmly, takes up the tongs and draws the meat from the fire. The least overdone piece he takes aside to set before Idril, and she sits still to eat it without complaint. He doesn’t seem much interested in taking his own share, but it’s as much as Finrod could ask for regardless. “Where did she get that preposterous jewelry, anyway?”

“Funny you should ask--”

“Findaráto was just telling us how he was going to save us from the ice with shiny things,” Aredhel says. “Next thing we know he’ll have wrought a bridge to the continent, so long as it’s encrusted with emeralds or something.”

“Don’t listen to him, sister,” Turgon says. “He just wants to saunter into Beleriand covered in jewels and dazzle the Moriquendi with his gifts.”

“Well, of course,” Finrod says. “I never denied it. Idril must keep that necklace, while we speak of gifts. It will suit her all the more when she’s grown.”

“ _I_ ,” says Turgon, finally taking a piece of meat for himself, “am not dazzled.”

But, as Finrod had expected, it had been worth the effort of bringing it all the same.


End file.
